Research Humanities

Research at the Tilburg School of Humanities focuses on transformation processes taking place in contemporary society, related to communication and culture, and analyses the underlying moral and ethical questions.

Veni awards NWO for three promising researchers

Three promising young reseachers of Tilburg University have been awarded a Veni grant by the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research (NWO). The grant consists of a maximum of 250,000 euro and will enable them to conduct innovative research for three years.

The awarded researchers and their projects are the following.

Lack of measurement invariance in multilevel data: A cluster-based
solution for making valid attribute comparisons

Dr. Kim de Roover, Tilburg School of Social and
Behavioral Sciences

When measuring unobservable attributes by observed variables like
questionnaire items, psychologists assume a measurement model (MM). When
comparing attributes based on item scores, they assume measurement invariance
across compared groups/subjects. My project presents methods for comparing MMs
across many groups/subjects and finding clusters of groups/subjects for which
comparisons are valid.

The value of admiration

Dr. Alfred
Archer, Tilburg School of Humanities

We admire heroes, saints, and film stars but what is admiration and what
role should it play in our lives? Using tools and insights from philosophy and
psychology, this project will investigate the nature and value of admiration,
when admiration is appropriate and admiration’s
role in education and leadership.

Twentieth-century psychology and philosophy were dominated by
behaviorism. The leading scholars were B.F. Skinner and W.V. Quine. How did
they develop their theories? How did they influence each other? And what are
the implications for the relation between psychology and philosophy? This projects answers these questions by examining
their archives.